![]() Recording sessions led to Young’s second album, Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, credited as Neil Young with Crazy Horse, with Whitten on second guitar and vocals. Nils Lofgren – Beggar’s Day (Eulogy for Danny Whitten): At first dubbed “War Babies” by Young, they soon became known as Crazy Horse. The trio agreed, so long as they were allowed to simultaneously continue on with The Rockets: Young acquiesced initially, but imposed a rehearsal schedule that made that an impossibility. Songwriter Neil Young, fresh from departing the Buffalo Springfield, with one album of his own under his belt, began jamming with the Rockets and expressed interest in recording with Whitten, Molina and Talbot. ![]() “I am not a preacher, but drugs killed a lot of great men.” He put that right with Gasoline Alley and he’s never really looked back.Danny Whitten died 18 November 1972, 43 years ago todayĭaniel Ray Whitten (– November 18, 1972) was an American musician and songwriter best known for his work with Neil Young and Crazy Horse, and for the song “ I Don’t Want To Talk About It“, a hit for Rita Coolidge, Rod Stewart and Everything but the Girl. The title track opens with a nice bass riff by Ronnie Wood but there isn’t much here. It opens with a somewhat weak cover of Street Fighting Man. I think An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down was a warmup for Gasoline Alley, though Macman’s opinion of the album is more positive than mine. The Faces first album First Step and Stewart’s debut solo album An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down were released almost simultaneously in the spring of 1970. Stewart was running his solo career in parallel with The Faces. Having said that their final album, 1973’s Ooh La La is, in my opinion, one of the most underrated albums of the 1970s. Ronnie Wood switched to guitar and together with Stewart’s showmanship gave the band the panache and gusto that never translated to the record. The remaining members of The Small Faces joined forces with Stewart and the Jeff Beck Group’s bassist, Ronnie Wood. The Jeff Beck Group split up at the same time as Steve Marriott left The Small Faces to form Humble Pie. It was number 1 in the UK, the US, Australia and Canada going gold in the US and Canada.Ĭlearly Rod realised that he needed be somewhere else and he left the band to join the Jeff Beck Group in 1967 singing on their first album Truth (1968). The record company didn't think it would be a hit, so they released it as the B-side of Reason to Believe. I said, ‘well we've run out of time now, these are all the tracks we've recorded’. Stewart told Q Magazine that “ Maggie May was more or less a true story about the first woman I had sex with … it nearly got left off because the label said it didn't have a melody. Maggie May (1971), co-written with Martin Quittenton, proves he is a good, perhaps even great songwriter, though there were those who at the time did not share’s Rod’s ear for a melody. What strikes me about Rod Stewart is that, however egotistical his colleagues in The Faces found him, he did not shy away from covering other people’s songs. The Rod Stewart album that really made it for him was, of course, 1975’s Atlantic Crossing which closed with Gavin Sutherland’s anthemic Sailing and included the late great Danny Whitten’s, he of Neil Young’s Crazy Horse, I Don’t Want to Talk About It. He covers the Womack-written It’s all over now, which was the Stones’ first number 1 in 1964, and by slowing down the tempo and softening it a little, he makes it a different song to the Stones’ version. ![]() The title track is co-written with Ronnie Wood, later of course of The Rolling Stones. The album showcases his strengths and maturity in his interpretation of songs like Dylan's Only A Hobo and Elton John's Country Comfort (both of which he covered before their composers) as well as on his own compositions. Stewart himself maintained for years afterwards that Gasoline Alley was the best thing he had ever done. When you listen to Gasoline Alley 50 years on, you can hear this. ![]() The magazine A History of Rock commented in 1983 that Stewart’s albums are “carefully constructed, his unique hoarse tones approaching soul, modern folk, R&B and his own simple but charming songs with power and passion.” He was writing about Rod Stewart (more properly Sir Roderick David Stewart, CBE) and next Wednesday Macman will be playing tracks from Gasoline Alley. ![]()
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